Maloney: Life with Joe, before and after his illness

8:37 PM,
May 12, 2014

Kathleen Maloney

Written by

Kathleen Maloney

My husband Joe and I were blessed to enjoy 18 wonderful years together before he became ill. We shared a beautiful daughter and there was love, laughter, joy, hard work and so many plans for our future. However, like most families who have a loved one stricken with a serious illness, we began to speak in terms of "before Joe was ill" and "after Joe became ill."

On Christmas Day 2003, two weeks after Joe was laid off from the company where he had worked for 20 years, he fell to the floor of our family room and had a psychotic breakdown. We spent the next day in the emergency room, where he was given a full ...